“If I’ll tell you all the things I love about her I’m going to cry.”
“And if she is going to cry, I’m going to cry.”

“I was two years in a relationship while I was in love with someone else. Not a day went by without thinking of him. A few months ago I decided to end my relationship and now I finally get to be with this person. The love I have for him is so intense that sometimes it’s a bit overwhelming.”

Ed van der Elsken (1925-1990) is seen as one of the best street photographers of the Netherlands. The Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam currently has a big exhibition of his work and they’re organizing a photo contest in honor of Ed’s work. I was asked to be an ambassador of this photo contest. I took this photo last year at the Central Station of Amsterdam and selected this to be part of the contest. The reason for selecting this photo is that it reminded me of one my favorite portraits of Ed (Google: Ed van der Elsken, girl in subway). The assignment of the contest is to capture the interaction between you and the person you photograph. To enter you have to share (before May 1st) your photo on Facebook or Instagram and use #deverliefdecamera, #fotowedstrijd and @stedelijkmuseum. The winning photographers will receive a spot in the Ed van der Elsken’s exhibition in the Stedelijk Museum of Amsterdam.

“Last summer Max lost 10 kilo’s. He was stuck on a rooftop for two weeks and we couldn’t find him. Luckily we ended up finding him and we are happy that he is still here. Our costumers love him. Some even come in just to say hi to Max or give him some candy. Even though he is spoiled he also works.”
“Really? What does he do?”
“He has a weekly column in a local newspaper.”

“I got my first smartphone 2 years ago when I became a manager at the restaurant. It was a hard job and I worked way too many hours. It caused me to have a burn-out a few months later and so I had to quit my job but I got to keep the phone. In the following months I just rested, traveled and dedicated more time to things I love and being with people I care about.

I am a person who overthinks situations a lot. I wanted to be more spontaneous so I tried a lot of new things like downloading Tinder. I have this love-hate relationship with Tinder but like I said, I wanted to stop over thinking every situation so I decided to just go with the flow and have some fun.

One day I had a match with this girl on Tinder and after talking to her for a while we decided to meet up. We ended up talking the entire evening. A few days later we went to the Vondelpark and we sat there for hours. Even though I just met her we had a really good connection and now 7 months later I get to call her my girlfriend. We are currently on a one-week-living-together ’‘trial” but It has been 11 days and I haven’t been back to my own apartment ever since.“

“It’s a bit of a cliche story but I came to this city for love..”